"It is also a lengthy RPG; after 25 hours, I've only completed three chapters and there is still more to tell."

Any particular reason why the game isn't being completed before doing a final review? I know I've been through more than enough games where the end of a game gave me a significantly different impression (for better or worse) than the journey. I'd sort of expect this with print reviews because no one's going to make it through all of say Suikoden III in five days or whatever time the editors are allotted before hitting the press with a (partial) review, but why rush a site review when the constraints aren't the same?

Logged

It's never too late to start learning; it's always too early to stop learning.

Atlus gave online outlets a May 26th deadline/embargo for the review. Meaning that online sites had to have a review up on that day. If that deadline/embargo wasn't there, I would have taken another few weeks to complete the game and the review would have been rather late. And it's not like I had the game since January. I only had it since the 2nd week of May or so. Nutshell: I had a deadline to meet.

I normally like to complete games before I review them, but if circumstances indicate that I cannot complete it, I say so, as I did here. I call that integrity. The first Astonishia Story game was really short, so I still feel that my review showcased that 2 is a much longer game.

Of course, had I not mentioned that I hadn't completed the game, this wouldn't come up and ignorance would be bliss, right? So now my integrity comes to bite me in the ass because I'm honest with my readers. Yeah, that makes me feel really good.

"It is also a lengthy RPG; after 25 hours, I've only completed three chapters and there is still more to tell."

Any particular reason why the game isn't being completed before doing a final review? I know I've been through more than enough games where the end of a game gave me a significantly different impression (for better or worse) than the journey. I'd sort of expect this with print reviews because no one's going to make it through all of say Suikoden III in five days or whatever time the editors are allotted before hitting the press with a (partial) review, but why rush a site review when the constraints aren't the same?

If you don't think there are time restraints with pre-release titles in the online world, too, you're mistaken. You're absolutely right that we finish the great majority of the games we review - it's an editorial requirement when we're dealing with retail copies of games. When we can't, it's noted in the review as such. I'm honestly not sure what the issue here is - the review noted the amount of time was spent with the game. Ditto for when I reviewed EverQuest Online Adventures back in the day.

We keep our integrity with our readers as our number one priority, and when our normal standard of game completion cannot be met, it is noted. Additionally, just because we're an online outlet doesn't mean we don't have deadlines for reviews here - when you only have two and a half weeks with a game to review and it's not your paying job (we are all volunteers here), you can't complete a game 100% of the time and still meet deadline. When that happens, reviewers note it in their review.

Legend of Dragoon came close in that regard. First two discs were lame, but partway through disc 3 was when the story started getting really interesting and I was like, "Soggy muffins! Why did you take so long to finally get good?" That final leg was almost enough to redeem the game for me.

What John (KeeperX) said is the key point. We are ALL about honesty and integrity here. We disclose what we put into the game. If we don't beat the game, we say so. And while such a thing is usually due to time constraints, there are also occasions where a game sucks SO hard that you simply cannot bear to go to the end to write the review. But we *always* disclose that information, as a policy.

Don't let this one review make you think we never beat games. On the contrary, take it as a positive sign that we're happy to give full disclosure to our readers about how much time we sink into games we play.